Thursday, May 19, 2011

On Monday Brian turned the big 30. We both took the day off because Monday + turning 30 = could be painful when spent at work. It also gave us the opportunity to celebrate the over a few days, which in my opinion is how all birthdays should be!

Sunday after Bay to Breakers we cleaned up and headed to Alamo for a backyard BBQ at the home of our California mom (aka our good friend's mom who is awesome). It was a low-key, but fun, BBQ. We ate yummy food, drank beers, guys played croquet and the ladies chatted. I didn't bring any sort of dessert (oops!) but I did make B a bireerthday banner - made from beer coasters - and a birthday crown!

beerthday banner

if you ask me, 30 looks pretty good!

After the BBQ Sunday, B conked out, but not before he said "you're the bomb" (aww!), and I got to work finishing up his birthday surprises. The biggest project was his 30 birthday collage (pictured below).

Inspired by this Martha picture perfect birthday, I thought it would be fun to make a big 30 for B to wake up to. Since we don't have a lot of friends and family close by, this felt like a way to have them join the celebration even from afar. Weeks before his birthday I sent out secret emails and Facebook message to friends and family. I asked for pictures with party hats, signs, pets or a fun birthday message, and per B's sense of humor the funnier the better.

I loved receiving the photo emails back! I had to try hard not to open them when B was around because I would always laugh. Once I had received most of the photos, I made 4x6 prints. Using poster board I cut a large 3 and a 0. I then arranged the photos and taped them down. I used baby and childhood photos, courtesy of mama Lackore, to fill in the gaps.

Monday morning I got up early and taped the 30 on our closet doors. I was trying to be extremely quiet but B was already up. As he looked at the collage there was lots of laughing and me telling him the story behind the photos.

After presents (I got him a home brew kit + pale ale ingredients), bagels and coffee we headed to the Oakland Foot and Tea Spa for one hour foot reflexology and massages. I treated myself to a session too, didn't want B to get lonely, and was SO happy I did. It was amazing, especially after our B2B run.

We left the spa, completely relaxed, and headed to San Francisco for a tour of Giants Stadium! It was raining that day so the tour was mainly indoors, but cool to see the locker rooms, dugout and stand on the field. We ran into these Giant characters along the way.

Giants are the only MLB team licensed to use the Peanuts characters,
because Charles Shulz is a Giants fan!

Due to the rain, possible detoxing from the reflexology and B's old age, we headed home to relax. Although I felt lame sitting on the couch on his birthday it was really nice! We ended up spending the rest of the day at home watching movies. In honor of his beerthday, B drank his 30th Anniversary Sierra Nevada he received as a gift.

Although it wasn't an intentional theme, I realized a lot of the birthday stuff revolved around beer, hence the 30th Beerthday post title.

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